


If You Died, I'd Die Right By Your Side

by gatonip



Category: The Adventure Zone (Podcast)
Genre: Angst, Gen, MAJOR spoilers if you haven't listened to ep 60 yet, but I didn't wanna let go of this idea so easily, come suffer with me, like way too much of it, some of this will probably get debunked in the next couple of eps
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-16
Updated: 2017-04-16
Packaged: 2018-10-19 13:14:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 980
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10640571
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gatonip/pseuds/gatonip
Summary: The Hunger kills indiscriminately. It has no concept of twins, or how it shouldn't kill just one and not the other.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Will I ever learn how to write in anything other than second person again? Signs point to no

The first time you met, Kravitz told you that your initial bounty – the one that landed your file on his desk to begin with – was set for covering eight deaths. He asked you incredulously how you managed to escape the Raven Queen’s grasp once, let alone eight times. You were just as confused as he was. You surely would have remembered dying eightfold; you’re not nearly old enough yet to warrant a lapsed memory.

It’s not until your memories begin to return that you learn just where all those death points came from.

The first time it happened, you barely had a chance to see it coming. A year had come and gone, and you hadn’t yet learned the pattern of the Hunger appearing every year, on the dot, like it always would be. It caught you off guard the way it did that first year, but this time, you and Lup weren’t so lucky as to be the first ones to book it back to the ship. There was just too much distance from where you were trapped, and not enough of an opening for either of you to escape. You looked at the Hunger descending upon you, you looked at Lup, and a split-second decision was made. You moved before it could register in your brain that it’d be the last move you’d make. The shock kept you from feeling any pain. Knowing it’d buy her a way out kept you from feeling any guilt.

Magnus had died on your first go-around and made it out okay, your first discovery that the ship was capable of reviving the seven of you. But it was still such a new brand of technology, so temperamental, that you had all agreed not to take the risk. Maggie had been right as rain, but the next person might not be so lucky. And so it was a pleasant surprise when you opened your eyes again and took in the view of the inside of the Star Blaster, and the anxious looks on the faces of your shipmates.

And then you were suddenly looking up at the ceiling, pinned to the ground underneath a screaming, fuming elf.

“Don’t you ever, _ever_ , do something that _stupid_ again, do you hear me, Taakobell Taaco?! I will hand deliver your sorry ass to the Raven Queen herself if you dare do something like that ever again!!!” She half-heartedly took swipes at your face, but the tears rolling down her cheeks and falling onto yours hurt more than her punches ever could. You held her and muttered apologies as she cried herself sick in relief, and the two of you somehow became more glued at the hip than ever after that.

You thought you understood the pain you had put her through, that you swore you wouldn’t put her through again. It wasn’t until the roles were reversed that you truly understood.

A decade and a year later, and the Hunger descended upon you all again. It felt like an old malevolent friend at that point in time. You were prepared for its arrival, but still not quite far enough along in your research to know how to switch into offense just yet. It was the same old dodge and weave, the mad dash back to the Star Blaster. The two of you went left when you were supposed to go right and hit a dead end. You frantically searched for a way out, and when you turned to tell Lup you’d found one you realized that the Hunger had branched off right at your direction. You didn’t have time to move. You didn’t have time to even blink. And you didn’t have time to stop her from taking the hit for you.

Even with your memories intact again, you can’t remember those frenzied two minutes of running the last stretch of the way to the ship. You can live with losing those two minutes of your memory.

Standing on the deck of the Star Blaster and waiting for Lup to return was, at that point in your life, the hardest thing you had ever gone through. There aren’t words in any language you know that can describe just how agonizing it was, the five minutes of being unable to do anything but wait and worry and question every interaction you and the rest of your group had had lately. Were your bonds strong enough? Were you all close enough for this to work properly again? Were you going to lose your sister because you couldn’t move past your insecurities and reservations, couldn’t drop your walls enough around anyone but her? The sick irony of it all was becoming too much; if she had regenerated even a half a minute later than she did, you don’t think you would have been conscious for it.

As it was, the ship did its magic and when the light subsided your sister was back in pristine condition. You latched on to her immediately, the two of you toppling to the ground when she was unable to hold up your sudden dead weight. The reunion was a messy cacophony of tears and apologies from the both of you: her for becoming a hypocrite, and you for having put her through this first.

You made a pact that day, one you swore up and down to every god and goddess you knew that you wouldn’t break, that you’d never make each other know a life without the other again. The short amounts of time you both experienced that were more than enough. And so every time the other members of your crew made it back to the Star Blaster after another run in with the Hunger, either both of you were on the ship, or neither of you were.

It was the one pact you never thought one of you would break.

**Author's Note:**

> Go listen to 'Hey Now' by Matt and Kim if you'd like a very upbeat song about these two making a pact to die together
> 
> Also they haven't called him Taakobell - pronouncing it Tah-ko-ble, like 'noble' - since ep 1 but I'm still very much a fan of it being Taako's full first name. If only so Lup can call him that during sincere moments and when she's trying to annoy him


End file.
